Your Good Isn't Good Enough
by WindTreesandStars
Summary: They meet in the mirror, reflections of who they once were and who they now are facing them.  He tries to evade the image and project one he's comfortable seeing; she insists on looking at the reality confronting them. Should be double-tagged as angst.


_AN: Set during 2x16, "Original Song". A short angsty drabble about what may have been going through their minds during the scene at the mirror right before Rachel went on stage to sing "Get it Right". The more I go back to look at the scene, the more I am convinced that she, at least, did not hear Finn's "Break a leg" as meaning "I love you"; caught up in seeing Quinn publicly claim him by holding his hand, struggling with the knowledge that once more he's kept a relationship with someone else a secret from her, and feeling like their "ship" has sunk under, Rachel challenges him by pointing out what he is _not_ saying this year and implies that he owes it to her to finally listen to what she's been trying to say to him since Sectionals, to listen to what he has refused to hear._

_I own nothing and have no affiliation whatsoever with the show _Glee.

**Your Good Isn't Good Enough**

_Rachel:_

She saw him come up behind her in the mirror. She thought he would come. Knowing him as she did, she was aware of the conflict stirring in him now, was aware that he'd feel the need to come and make it seem like things were OK, like things were good with them. He always wanted to be the good guy.

For a brief moment they'd shared a glance laden with mutual memory—memory of their duet last year, of all that had brought them together and then thrust them apart. It had surprised her, when she turned her head, to see him already staring at her; much more often than not, she was the one casting looks his way.

But the moment was broken when a third gaze joined in, and when a hand reached out to grasp his hand so far down the aisle from her. She saw him freeze. Saw him look down at his suddenly claimed hand. Saw the realization dawn in his face that the hand reaching out was intended to send him a silent message, and saw him absorb what that message meant. And, although she kept her gaze lowered on those hands woven together, she still , from the corner of her eye, saw him look to her again to confirm that he'd understood the message fully—saw him note the absence of surprise or shock on her face. It didn't take a shout or even a whisper for Quinn to make her point: _she knows, Finn; she's fully aware; the time for secrecy is over; 'after Regionals' begins right now_.

She had already known before tonight. Now he knew that she knew, and he knew that she was aware of his attempts yet again to keep her in the dark, to hide something from her. She didn't bother to try to compose her face, to hide the hurt she was feeling. Let everything be out in the open; she was tired of hiding, tired of playing the game.

She saw him come up behind her in the mirror, on his face the façade of the friend, the co-captain, the encourager. She didn't know just what he would say: if he'd try to explain, to apologize, to make it better. Had it been any of those things, she might have let it slide, or even helped him in an attempt to make amends. She hadn't been prepared for what he did say, and it felt like it would knock her over.

She knew that he knew the significance of those words to them. He knew that she knew and remembered. And here he was, stripping them of their meaning, trying to turn them into mere well-wishes before a performance, rewriting history to deny what had been between them and was now gone. He was looking to her to help him; counting on her to play it cool, to act like it was OK. To pretend the performance was all that was on her mind and that he was merely trying to help her prepare for it. He was asking her to deny the pain in her heart and her soul, so he could tell himself he had done nothing wrong, so he could let himself off the hook. Well, he was the one who had told her to reach for the deep pain, the hard pain, to track it to its source. Would he appreciate the irony, she wondered, that the very advice he had given her now made it impossible for her to make things easy for him.

She saw him come up behind her in the mirror; heard the words fall from his lips; saw the self-satisfied smile on his face as he waited for her to confirm for him that he was doing the mature thing and that she was content to take whatever he felt he could offer her. But she wasn't content, and she wasn't going to pretend, and she was through with trying to make anything easy when it all was so hard.

So instead of saying "thank you" or confessing to nerves that she could invite him to ease, she named the unspoken memory hovering before them. She named it, and it took on corporeal form.

She watched him behind her in the mirror. She watched his eyes fall as his mouth fell open. Saw him look down, then up at her as if there was something, anything, he could say. Saw his eyes fall again, his shoulders rise and fall with a small sigh, his head slightly nod, and, once more, heard his silence tell her what she needed, but didn't want, to know.

"I really like your song," he said, trying to reposition himself in the safe, comfortable territory of friend, co-captain, encourager. Evading, as had he had done so many times before, the hard truths between them; falling back, in the face of something risky and difficult, to playing it easy and safe. But easy and safe had never gotten them anywhere, and she didn't think she'd ever really known how to play that game anyhow.

Once upon a time that now seemed so very long ago, he had asked her to deny the reality of a truth between them, had pled with her to keep it to herself, had run away rather than face up to something that threatened the comfortable limits in which he dwelt. As then, when she had called him out by naming his denial and evasion, she once again struck to the heart of the truth between them.

She turned away from his reflection in the mirror. She looked him straight in the eyes and told him to listen to her, to listen to everything she was about to say. To let himself hear what he'd been pushing her to express in song, what he'd been refusing to hear her speak in words: her pain, her sorrow, the truth of her soul. She knew there was nothing she could do to influence how he would respond to that truth, and she was weary of the task of trying to coax him to do so. It was no longer good enough for her that he be good only when forced to be so; she wasn't the only one who needed to get it right.

She turned away from him. Leaving him behind, she strode out onto the stage, head held high, preparing herself to perform, to try to lead her team to victory with the power of her song. Despite herself, she turned her head for a brief moment, looking back to see if he had heard her, if he was willing to listen to the truths she would momentarily express. She turned her head to the side, and saw that he was not there. One more thing to let go of, she thought; one more sorrow to absorb into her voice. She smiled at her teacher, turned forward to face the front, and waited for the music to begin so she could bring her song to life.


End file.
